Obituary

I never thought I would find closure in the form of an obituary.

I spent years mourning the slow, painful death of my marriage. Sometimes I felt like a failure because I knew it needed to end, that I needed it to, and sometimes I felt like a piece of me was broken and missing. Numb. This was my norm for nearly eight years. You can't imagine how horrible it is dealing with someone who won't let you go but doesn't care about you. This is the main reason I decided to leave my home state. I needed distance, and I needed it badly.

On the 25th, I received a call from my Mom. What I thought was going to be the usual Christmas stuff turned into, have you heard from him? I hadn't and was glad for it. Until I found out about some social media posts that were vaguely stating that he was gone. That fact quickly turned into a spiral of worry, dread, anger, and more worry. I tried contacting his family, no one would answer, or return calls. I called the police, hospitals, nobody had any information on where he was, or what if anything happened.

Finally, I received a call from a funeral home in Texas. He was there, and the only reason they were calling me was that his mother had been informed she couldn't have his remains because they found out he's still legally married. Now I'm left picking up the pieces of the life of a man who broke me, and mine. Trying to make sure that his last wishes are met in a way that he would want. Trying to deal with his live-in "common law" girlfriend, who doesn't seem to understand you aren't considered a common-law couple in Texas if you're married to someone else.

I'm sad that he took his life, that he felt he had no other way, and I feel horrible knowing and feeling a little giddy that I'm free. Finally free, and that at the end of this, it's done. So I sat there, mentally listing what would need to be taken care of. I did what I could to make things right, I sent him home to his mother, and contacted everyone that I could think of who knew him outside of Texas.

Sitting there, doing these things, going through these motions, the one thing I couldn't do was write his obituary.